Mateo
n ï m
Mateo Lugo
Mateo Lugo is a guitarist, composer and improviser whose compositional work seeks to engage in invented, imagined, algorithmic and poetic procedures to arrive at unfamiliar sounds and configurations. He has made scores out of a busy highway, the unpredictable patterns in shore surf, and the ephemeral translations of a dancing body. Born in Caracas, Venezuela in 1984, Lugo attended Berklee College of Music, double-majoring in Jazz Composition and Guitar Performance. He then later obtained a Masters in Composition at Mills College in Oakland, California. There, he studied closely with Zeena Parkins, William Winant, David Bernstein, and Fred Frith, and was awarded the Elizabeth Mills Crothers Award for Outstanding Composition. For the past 10 years, Lugo has delved in embodiment strategies and modalities for improvisation that challenge traditional dancer-musician paradigms; an interest shared in longstanding collaborations with Haggai Cohen Milo. This work is most recently exemplified in pieces such as “Jeptha’s Daughter (2015)” at the Bayerische Staatsoper with Saar Magal, and “Savage (2016)” in NYC with Katherine Maxwell.